The Darker, Demanding Side of Blogging

An article titled "Blogs Gone Bad" in the Spring 2005 issue of The New Atlantis (published by the Ethics and Public Policy Center) contemplates the dangers and difficulties of blogging:

Some bloggers can feel strained by the interactivity of blogs—the comments and feedback from readers. Glenn Reynolds, the University of Tennessee law professor who writes the popular Instapundit blog, told Wired News last summer that he gets e-mails from people asking if he’s alright if he hasn’t posted in several hours. With his hundreds of thousands of readers every day, Reynolds sometimes says he feels like a “public utility.” Another blogger, James Lileks, described the demands of the blogging routine: “This is an odd hobby. It’s like having a train set, a gigantic train set in the basement, and in the morning you not only find a derailment, you find people streaming out of the tiny houses yelling at you.”

And some finally succumb to “blog fatigue” and give up. Describing the wearying interaction that led him to quit blogging, Steven Den Beste said, “nearly every article I write draws anywhere from five to fifty letters containing corrections, disagreements, comments about things I ‘left out’ because ‘I didn’t know,’ or other forms of kibitzing.” Another blogger, Andrew Sullivan, complained last May about his grueling schedule and wondered “what the half-life of a blogger is.” (He seems to have found out: In February, he announced a hiatus from blogging.) A huge number of blogs—the majority, in fact—are abandoned within just a few months.

The Insight Scoop is not, of course, the most productive blog in the world, but we've been at it for nearly a year now and hope to keep going for as long as good coffee and cable modems are available. But enough  about that: I need to post more stuff before a non-albino Jesuit monk slaps me upside the  head again...ouch!

Comments

[Ed Peters]

Not at this level of intensity, but I've experienced all of those things on my canon law blog. What strikes me is the number of people who (A) can't or won't read what I've actually written, yet (B) have no bashfulness in expressing total disagreement with me. I should add, yes, I get my share of thank-you notes too. But at this point, blogging is for me a matter of service, and maybe of conscience (as in duty), since it puts not one thin dime into my pocket.

[Mark Brumley]

Carl, thanks very much for posting the excerpt. As you know, I have been ambivalent about blogging. Certainly, I see its value, but it also has serious dangers. Like any good thing, it can be abused. Unfortunately, that "can be" frequently becomes an "is".

[Ed Peters]

I used to pass over Brumley's stance on this a truism, with the attendant limitations on all truisms. But it might be truer than I thought at a deeper level. I am beginning think blogging might have peaked.

Random thoughts: 1) Total strangers feel quite free to be VERY pushy with bloggers, and that grates on my southern/midwestern system of manners. Especially when they are total idiots to boot. 2) We all, bloogers included, likely overestimate the ability of people to read, understand, and benefit by content-rich blogs. Just as active Catholics usually over-estimate how much pew-Catholics really know about the Faith, or how political activists usually over-estimate how much most folks really care about politics, so bloggers over-estimate how much ideas matter to most internet surfers, etc. We are talking to a very small audience (I know, I know, some numbers sugest quite otherwise). Anyway, Brumley might be more right than he usually is. I don't know. Still watching.

[Teresa Polk]

This article comes at an interesting time. Anglo-Catholic priest/blogger Al Kimel (Pontifications weblog at http://pontifications.classicalanglican.net/ yesterday posted on his blog his resignation as a priest in the Episcopal Church and his decision to become a Roman Catholic priest. Fr. Kimel has written his and other people's thoughts about Anglican and Catholic issues, with a priority on theology. His blog was a finalist in the "Most Theological Blog" category for 2005 Catholic Blog Awards not long ago. I wondered how many knew he was then in the Episcopal Church. As of Wednesday night, he gave his resignation to his church's vestry and became officially Catholic.

[Teresa Polk]

Actually, it would be more correct to say that Fr. Kimel's resignation will be effective July 1, and that he will thereafter become officially Catholic. However, he made his decision public Wednesday evening and posted it on his weblog yesterday.

[Mark Brumley]

I'm glad, Ed, that you think I might be more right than usual. Up from 98.7 percent isn't bad, but I will continue to strive to attain 100 percent.

[Camille Bodden]

I love the metaphor of the derailing train set with the little people screaming!!! I was in one of your cars!!! Keep the faith!Let me get back to my blogging as we speak!

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